Rasps, cutting units and other ancillaries for removing bones are well-known in the field. These ancillaries must be hard enough and sufficiently resistant to wear to be able to attack bone and withstand the heavy pressures resulting from the action of a blade with which they cooperate on bone. To date, metals have always been used, which are sufficiently resistant to wear to attack the bone. What is more, they can be reused after re-sterilisation in the autoclave.
However, these ancillaries are expensive to produce due to the material used and the manufacturing method (machining). In addition, for reasons of patient safety, it is not desirable for a rasp or a cutting unit of this kind to be reused a second time by a surgeon after he has himself carried out further sterilisation, particularly because of the risk associated with infections such as Kreuzfeld Jakob disease.